<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>always one of us by softambrollins</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25905721">always one of us</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/softambrollins/pseuds/softambrollins'>softambrollins</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Men's Football RPF</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Celebrations, Fluff, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Liverpool F.C., M/M, Reunions</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 01:56:54</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,550</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25905721</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/softambrollins/pseuds/softambrollins</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Stevie and Xabi: from the leaving of Liverpool to Number 19.</p><p>
  <i>He wonders sometimes whether Xabi fell in love with him or the city first. And maybe it's fucked-up and terrible to feel jealous, almost. But maybe it's really just one and the same. And always has been.</i>
</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Xabi Alonso/Steven Gerrard</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>25</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>always one of us</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Happy S/X day! I actually wrote something for the first time in five years!</p><p>First off, PREMIER LEAGUE CHAMPIONS 2019-2020, Y'ALL. 🏆🎉🎆 I didn't think I'd see this day, and definitely not in the extraordinary, record-breaking fashion we did it, but I've been waiting half my life for this and the club's been waiting 30 years and life is good and I can officially die happy now.</p><p>I started writing this in January, before everything happened, so this mostly ignores the giant break in the season and the current state of the world. I just had a lot of (understandable) feelings about Liverpool and historically, what I do when I have Liverpool feelings is write S/X fic. So here we are.</p><p>I'm still really sad we never got to see Stevie win a Premier League title but as he said in his doc, the story's still incomplete. I hope seeing us win the CL and the PL over the last two seasons after just missing out so many times brought some peace to him though, like it did for all of us.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There's something that Xabi told him once before he got on a plane years ago that he'll always remember.</p><p>"Don't let it destroy you."</p><p>He thought he meant the league, the disappointment, the frustration, the cold, bitter days when it's so hard to <i>believe</i> anymore, coming so, <i>so</i> close but ending up with nothing to show for it. </p><p>But on the morning in January when the news finally breaks, he thinks maybe he meant something else all along.</p><p>*</p><p>He watches Xabi's Madrid win La Décima while he sits in the stands. And maybe that's where it all starts. Because it feels wrong and so far away from that heady night in Istanbul and he suddenly feels so <i>old</i>, in his bones. Like he's someone else now. Like time is running out. </p><p>Later, he pulls Xabi in by his second Champions League winner's medal, one hand fisted in his coat, and he tastes like champagne and moonlight. But not like he did that night. He tastes <i>different</i>, like a stranger, like a ghost of who he was. Who they were. </p><p>It feels <i>wrong</i> and unsatisfying and maybe that's the first time in his whole life that he thinks maybe it's time to stop chasing after past glories. He's never gonna get that back. It's never going to be the same. Xabi was always going to leave. He couldn't hold on to him just like he can't give everyone what they want from him. He slipped away from him just like the league did. Just like everything else will continue to do. Titles and matches and the team, the club, his own body, betraying him. He couldn't make him stay just like he can't be the saviour they need. Not anymore.</p><p>*</p><p>Xabi goes to Bayern the day Liverpool and Madrid are drawn together in the Champions League and he almost has to laugh at the irony. </p><p>Xabi calls him after his medical from Germany, says, so quietly, "I'm — I'm sorry. It feels like we keep just missing each other." </p><p>Stevie doesn't think about it so often anymore, if he'd left for Chelsea all those years ago, if Xabi had replaced him like he was supposed to. He doesn't believe in fate, he believes in hard work and never giving up and making things happen for himself, but it's hard not to think that it was something akin to fate that brought them together ten years ago. And maybe now fate's trying to tell them something else. Maybe it's just not their time. Will never be their time. Maybe what they once had is all they'll ever get.</p><p>"Part of me is relieved," he admits. "Because I don't want to play against you." </p><p>"I miss Anfield," Xabi breathes out. "I miss <i>you</i>."</p><p>"I can't believe it's been ten years since you came here." Somehow Xabi feels both closer and farther away than he's ever been.</p><p>"I didn't think I'd ever leave. That was the first time I'd ever been so far from home but it was just <i>right</i> from the very first minute. Like I was <i>supposed</i> to be there." Xabi doesn't believe in fate either, he knows, but maybe when it comes to some things, no one can deny it.</p><p>"And then you met me and it all changed," Stevie teases. </p><p>Xabi chuckles softly on the other end of the line. "You were intense. It was intimidating. For a while. Until I realised that you were just a dumb kid like me. That under all of it, the armband and the mythos, you were scared to death too."</p><p>"I didn't know what the hell I was doing back then," he says. "Just pushing forward, not looking back, because otherwise everything would just fall apart around me."</p><p>"I think that's how we did it," Xabi says, voice low and pensive. "It wasn't about miracles or magic in the end. It was just avoiding disaster at all costs. Because we didn't think we could survive it. After everything this club and this city had been through. Maybe it was as much desperation as heart and faith. I think we needed to create that one spark of magic to keep going. To get here. To make all the days that are not magic worth it."</p><p>"I don’t think I could've done it without you," Stevie tells him, honestly. </p><p>Despite the language barrier and the fact that on the surface they couldn't be more different, both in their backgrounds and their personalities, Xabi always just <i>got</i> Stevie. The man. And the myth. He knew where one ended and the other began. He knew when he needed to just strip all the pressures and expectations that were placed upon him away, and just be a dumb twenty-four year old, insecure and vulnerable and riddled with flaws and self-doubts and desiring things he maybe shouldn't want but couldn't stop himself from reaching out and just <i>taking</i> for himself. Because when an entire city's belief and happiness rest on your young shoulders, an incomprehensible burden for anyone to carry, when everything you do is for them, <i>always</i> for them, when you don't have your own identity anymore, maybe sometimes you need to reclaim yourself. You need to have something, <i>one thing</i>, for your own. And Xabi understood that. But he also knew when he needed that reassurance, that he could be what everyone needed him to be, Captain, talisman, leader of men. He could be both. He could be everything they wanted and he could be what he needed and maybe Xabi was the bridge between those two worlds. Those two Steven Gerrards. The one everyone knows and the one no one else gets to see.</p><p>Xabi believed in him either way. Even when he knew more than anyone that he could be weak and selfish. That he was the living embodiment of the hopes and dreams of an entire city but he still had all the burning needs and reckless impulses of any flesh and blood man. </p><p>He wonders sometimes whether Xabi fell in love with him or the city first. And maybe it's fucked-up and terrible to feel jealous, almost. But maybe it's really just one and the same. And always has been. </p><p>*</p><p>Xabi sends him a text that morning that just says: <i>I'm here if you need anything. Always. xx</i></p><p>It's a couple days later when everything's sort of died down again when he calls. </p><p>"Are you okay?" he asks hesitantly. People are so quiet and sombre around him these days, like they're at his funeral, and he almost can't bear it.</p><p>"I don't know. Maybe. I keep thinking about what you said before you left. And maybe I'm just being selfish. Maybe this feels like I'm giving up. And that's something I promised myself, promised <i>everyone</i>, I never would. Maybe they hate me now. Maybe <i>I</i> —" He cuts himself off with a shuddering gasp.</p><p>"No one hates you, Steven," he says gently. "We're grateful. <i>So</i> grateful. We always will be."</p><p>"Do you still love me even though I'm leaving?" he manages to get out, his throat feeling raw and tight.</p><p>"What?" Xabi asks now, sounding dazed, taken aback almost.</p><p>"I know that it's always been tangled up for you. In your head. In your heart. Is it possible to separate that? Or does it just…<i>break</i>?" </p><p>Stevie, he's been this person for the last sixteen years, for his entire life. Without the club, without the city, without that ball at his feet and their symphony of sound in sync with his own heartbeat and surrounding him like a suit of indestructible armour so that nothing could ever stop him, without bright, bright red over his chest and behind his eyelids every time he closes them, then what is he? He gave them everything he had, but in turn, they gave him more than he can ever begin to fathom, not in a million lifetimes. He could never repay that. He could stay here a hundred years, run until his bones turn to dust, and it won't ever be enough.</p><p>"It broke my heart when I heard," Xabi confesses. "But I understand. I know who you are, Steven. Who you <i>really</i> are. You'll always be the same person even without all of this."</p><p>"Maybe <i>I</i> don't know who I am without it. But maybe that's better." Maybe he can be someone new now and maybe that's not the most terrible fate in the world anymore. Maybe he can just be Steven Gerrard, human being. No expectations. No world-changing victories. No earth-shattering catastrophes. Maybe his heart is only his own for the first time. Maybe it can finally rest now after a decade of carrying the belief of millions. Maybe it's not really giving up. He still has his own faith. He'll always believe.</p><p>"They still love you. They'll always love you. You gave them everything you had. More than that. You gave <i>us</i> everything. I hope you can rest easy knowing that. I hope you can be at peace now. That's all I've ever wanted," Xabi says, his voice desperate and almost pained.</p><p>"Why does everyone act like I'm dying?" Stevie sighs.</p><p>Xabi laughs now. "Because Liverpool without Steven Gerrard is <i>unthinkable</i>. It's like the whole world is different now. For all of us." He sounds like he's on the verge of tears. Or maybe he's been silently crying this whole time.</p><p>"They'll be okay, right?" he asks tentatively. He knows that Xabi knows what he's really asking for: <i>Tell me I'm doing the right thing. Please.</i></p><p>"They'll be okay," he says soothingly. "Everyone will be fine. I just care that <i>you're</i> okay."</p><p>"I think I will be. Someday. But nothing's gonna be the same again."</p><p>"I'll never forget," Xabi says, voice breaking. "Not one minute."</p><p>"I'll never forget either," Stevie promises him.</p><p>*</p><p>Xabi flies to Liverpool just to play thirty minutes in the same shirt as him and it feels like old times again, like the last six years have just disappeared.</p><p>They sit in the empty stands afterwards as the sun goes down and look out at the darkened pitch.</p><p>"I still think about that last season, you know," Xabi says after a long moment of silence. "Like, what if…"</p><p>Stevie thinks about that season every day. And the last one. The last chance he had. He thinks about all of them. He doesn't ask, <i>Would you have stayed if we had?</i></p><p>He shrugs. "At least you always leave on a high. That's something." </p><p>That doesn't feel like giving up. Or maybe it's just an illusion. Xabi Alonso, playing for all the European legends, winning the World Cup, winning everything there was to win. Doing everything he ever wanted. Everything he was destined for. Things he couldn't do with Stevie in the end. But Stevie knows who he really is under all that. He found something he never expected, right here, in this stadium, next to him, and some part of him would've given it all up to keep it. But he couldn't do that. He had to fulfil his destiny, prove to himself that he could do it, take a risk and survive out there in the unknown, get everything he wanted out of life before it was too late. Xabi Alonso doesn't believe in fate. But somehow he's right back here again. It's like he was <i>always</i> here; there's always been a piece of this place, of Stevie, inside him, leading him back like a compass pointing home.</p><p>"I think I just hate thinking about everything going <i>bad</i>. Because everything does, eventually," Xabi says, tone almost vulnerable. And it's the first time he's said that out loud to him.</p><p>"Like this?" Stevie asks evenly. But he can't even find it in himself to be bitter anymore.</p><p>"Stevie…" he says, turning to look at him with mournful eyes.</p><p>"I know, I know… It was just timing, right?" he says soberly. "And...life. When you start thinking about <i>what if</i>s, it's hard to stop."</p><p>Xabi shakes his head. "I don't believe in other lives. I think everything happens just how it's supposed to. I was supposed to come here. I was supposed to leave. And I was supposed to come back. And here I am."</p><p>"And what about us?" he says, his eyes falling away from Xabi's face.</p><p>"I think that was supposed to happen too," he says, voice quiet but sure. "We keep thinking about <i>what if</i>s and alternate possibilities, but we're forgetting something."</p><p>"What?" Stevie asks, raising his gaze to regard him curiously.</p><p>"The story's not over yet," Xabi says, looking him right in the eyes.</p><p>Stevie just stares at him with parted lips, feeling like he suddenly can't breathe anymore. And then he just nods at him.</p><p>*</p><p>It's the twenty-fifth of May, and they've just been thrashed in his last match and they've finished in sixth, and he's sitting on his couch next to Xabi, an arm's length apart but it feels like an infinite distance to traverse. They haven't said anything in a long time, just listening to each other breathe into the silence like they just don't want to be alone tonight. And there's a lingering ache so deep in his chest that he thinks it might kill him now if it hasn't before.</p><p>"I'm so sorry," Xabi says eventually. And he doesn't want pity, and Xabi knows that, and it's not his fault, it's not anyone's fucking fault, but here they are again, tumbling all the way back down to the bottom again, after they slowly made that long, painful trek up the mountain, scratching and clawing for every inch they could take, and maybe they're just doomed to never watch the sun rise from the summit again.</p><p>"It's — I didn't think it would end like this, you know?" But then again, he never thought it would end at all. "But I guess I just have to...carry on. Throw it all away. Keep the good parts. And it was <i>really</i> good. For a time."</p><p>"You know, I might say that La Décima, the World Cup, they were just as good. But I'm lying. I could play for a million years and nothing would ever be as good as that. It's like, I didn't even know football could <i>be</i> that before it happened. And maybe I've been trying to process it ever since. But when you do the greatest thing you ever could do when you're so young, when it's only the beginning, where do you go from there?"</p><p>Stevie nods. "It made us and it ruined us at the same time. Because we knew we'd never get anything close to that again."</p><p>"It's almost a tragedy somehow. But I wouldn't trade it for anything."</p><p>For better or worse, everything that's happened was because of that. He is who he is because of that. Maybe he would've left a long time ago without it. Maybe he would've won titles elsewhere but they would've felt hollow. There'd always be something missing. Maybe he and Xabi would've never had what they did, they'd never be here at all. Xabi went searching far and wide for something to replicate that feeling and he never found it. Stevie stayed for years and years, hoping and waiting, and he came close, once, twice, so many times, but it wasn't meant to be in the end. It's been ten years and it still defines them and probably will for the rest of their lives.</p><p>But maybe it's enough. They gave that moment to the world and the world gave it to them in turn. And maybe now he can get on a plane and leave after thirty-five years, knowing he gave them this one thing that remains legendary and transcendent and immortal. And even though right now it feels like there's no way out of the darkness threatening to drown them, and even though he might not be here to help drag them back out into the light, he knows that it won't be the last. They proved the impossible can happen once, and now it's only a matter of time.</p><p>*</p><p>It's ten years after their greatest triumph and Stevie leaves for the first time and he watches as Klopp talks to the press on TV from the other side of the world.</p><p><i>Doubters to believers.</i> And it feels like for the first time in a long time, they actually take it to heart.</p><p>And he thinks, <i>Maybe.</i></p><p>Maybe this is what they were all waiting for. He can feel it. It feels like something starting again.</p><p>*</p><p>After Xabi's announcement breaks, they meet in a hotel in Liverpool, and he's <i>right there</i> and he feels closer and more real and more present than he has since he left. All those other times they were together, it was like he was only half there, a shadow that he couldn't quite fit his hands around, like trying to catch smoke, forever slipping out from between his fingers. He was always a second away from getting on another plane, flying far away from him again. Stuck in two places at once and never quite existing in either of them. Forever caught in the space between leaving and staying.</p><p>Maybe that was the appeal in the first place. He always belonged somewhere else, to another country and another life. He couldn't ever hold on to him, like a trophy or a dream, and refuse to let go. Maybe for someone who spent his whole life in one place, that was hard to resist. Something so different from everything else in his small world. Something less sure, less constant and never-changing. Xabi was always going to leave, and maybe there was something comforting in that. That he wasn't just meant to carry the weight of the world, to slowly succumb to that terrible yearning for things you can't have but can never let go pervading his bones and turning him to stone. That Stevie wasn't just gonna disappoint him like he did everyone else.</p><p>Maybe letting Xabi go meant he could let the rest of it go too. Eventually. Maybe he taught him that. </p><p>But now he doesn't have to be anywhere else. There's nothing else out there calling his name, tugging his beating heart towards it. At least for a moment. He's done all the rest, he's stretched his hands up to the heavens and brushed against the brightest stars every time. It's time to come back to earth. And he's right in front of him and looking right at him like he wouldn't rather be anywhere else in the world. Stevie's never really understood the particular dilemma of being torn in two directions, but maybe he does now, now that he's had to choose himself for the first time over everything else. And Xabi's chosen <i>him</i>.</p><p>So Stevie steps forward and lets himself do the thing he's fought so hard against before, because he couldn't, he <i>couldn't</i>, not when it would be cancelled out again by inevitable goodbyes and uncountable miles and the fading effects of time, but has been dying to do all this time. He kisses him and suddenly feels so, so free, like he can <i>breathe</i> for the first time in years and decades, because they don't have to be anything for anyone else anymore. They don't have to be symbols and legends and stories; they can just be two men, they can be the two boys they once were, that they never got to be. Just two bodies and two hearts who've always known each other better than anyone. They can just be <i>this</i>. Finally. Together.</p><p>He could almost cry from relief. Instead he just holds Xabi closer, kisses him hard and long and deep like he's been wanting to for years and years. Like he's <i>his</i> now completely. Like this is the most important thing in his life and in the world. Like this is all he has and it's <i>enough</i>. And Xabi just clings back onto him just as tightly.</p><p>They don't let go for a long time.</p><p>*</p><p>"Are you happy?" Xabi asks him afterwards, lying next to him on the bed, eyes staring back at him, intent and unblinking. It's the first time he's asked him that since Xabi left Liverpool.</p><p>"I think I could be now," he tells him honestly. "I think I could be."</p><p>*</p><p>He goes back to Liverpool, and he should have known that he couldn't stay away for long. But maybe he needed the time apart, the distance, to finally see it in a different way for the first time. And everything just feels <i>different</i> now from when he left, the mood around Melwood, lighter, brighter, hopeful. The players are young and eager and they're not jaded or bogged down by the oppressive weight of history or expectation. And Jurgen's optimistic spirit is infectious. No one's immune. He knows they're in good hands now. It's just what they needed. And what he needs. When he left, it was like his soul was being dragged down into the foundations of the city. But now it's a relief to be back. He's been gone for too long. And everywhere he looks now, there's reasons to believe again, like the dark gloom that had overshadowed the city for the last years has been washed away. </p><p>*</p><p>After the Bayern charity match, they roam around town like they used to years ago, hitting up all their old spots, and they're not twenty-five anymore and they both know it but it feels good to slip back into that past life. It almost doesn't hurt quite as much anymore.</p><p>Stevie grabs him and kisses him outside the pub in the glow of the streetlight and he tastes sweet and bright the way he did four years ago but it doesn't feel stolen now. It feels like it <i>belongs</i> to him.</p><p>Xabi laughs softly against his neck and says, voice hushed and bashful, "People are gonna see us." But he doesn't let go either.</p><p>And Stevie says, "I don't fucking care," and kisses him again, deep and lingering, and he thinks he could get used to this. Maybe his life doesn't have to be incomplete, even in this city drenched in memories, of blinding red and gold and beautiful, sparkling nights that he hoped would never end but also of old regrets and unfinished dreams, around every corner.</p><p>It's like he can see the story of his entire life painted into every pavement and brick wall and lamppost and maybe it's not all fading away after all. Maybe he wants to add to it. Maybe the colours are brighter than they've ever been tonight.</p><p>*</p><p>It's not meant to be in Kiev, but there'll be other times, he knows. There'll be other times.</p><p>He goes to Glasgow, for something new, something different, a new challenge, something he probably needs right now. Leaving's easier now. It doesn't feel so much like defeat. He knows he'll be back sometime. </p><p>*</p><p>They watch Barca at home together. And maybe he'd doubted too, for a moment, just a moment, but the fourth goal goes in and it's like a wildfire reigniting in his soul. It's been so cold and empty and stagnant for so long that he almost forgot what it was like. </p><p>The whistle blows and the Kop goes mental and he's smiling so hard that it hurts and laughing deliriously and maybe even crying a little and it's hard to even breathe anymore.</p><p>The sound of thousands singing <i>You'll Never Walk Alone</i> echoes through his ribcage and he clutches a hand to his heart like he doesn't think he can physically hold it inside his chest anymore and he looks at Xabi and his eyes are wide and awed and shining, shining like nights at Anfield, like the gleam of silverware, and maybe he never really forgot this feeling after all.</p><p>It feels like their name's already written on it, the way it was supposed to be, the way it's always been, for decades and decades. It felt like when Xabi's rebound went in to even it all out, like the Cup wanted to come home with them again.</p><p>He pulls him in close and throws his arms around him, hugs him tight, presses a warm kiss to his temple and then tucks his face into the side of his hair and closes his eyes, just breathes in deeply.</p><p>It's been hard to believe in fate for a long time, hard to trust it, when he was out there on the pitch and it felt insurmountable, but sometimes in football, with Liverpool, there's no choice but to believe in magic.</p><p>They don't just make history. It's always belonged to them. Written in the stars. Engraved in gold. They just have to <i>take</i> it. </p><p>*</p><p>They're in Madrid for the final, the second in two years, and fourteen years after their last victory. The one that belonged to the two of them. </p><p>It's different from the last time, that hot wild rush of adrenaline that didn't subside for hours, for days. His heart pounding in his chest so fast he thought it might give out on him. His head feeling light and his blood buzzing before even consuming a single drop of alcohol. But it's just as good. This time, the feeling is just warm and familiar and comforting, like a bright steady glowing in his chest. </p><p>They stumble back to their hotel after only a couple hours because they're way too old for this now. </p><p>When he wraps his hand firmly around Xabi's wrist and pulls him in for a kiss, it isn't impulsive or reckless or thoughtless. It just feels like <i>home</i>. Right and deliberate and undeniable. </p><p>He can still hear them outside singing in the streets. Painting Madrid bright, bright red just like four other cities before. And he feels something just <i>break</i> inside of him. </p><p>He pulls away suddenly, eyes going wide, lips falling open slightly, like a dawning realisation. Xabi looks concerned for a second, eyes narrowed, and he thinks he says his name but it's almost like he fades away from in front of him, his voice and his face. Or Stevie fades away from him. It feels like time <i>stops</i>, like everything else in the world, in his head and heart, just stills for a moment. And he feels it passing through him, like a wave, their voices, and with it, the hopes and dreams of millions, through his lungs, down his spine, to all his extremities. He exhales long and slow, like it's the first time in decades, eyes falling shut. Absorbing it, letting the knowledge and the contentment sink down deep into his bones.</p><p>When he opens his eyes again, Xabi's looking at him like he knows exactly what he's feeling.</p><p>"They're happy again. Only took us fourteen fucking years, but they're all finally happy again," he says, voice choked, feeling the tears welling up in his eyes. It's probably the first time Xabi's seen him cry in ten years. But it's good tears this time. It feels like pure and utter relief, like a heavy weight he's been carrying for five years, for much longer, finally being lifted off his shoulders. Maybe leaving and having Xabi back after all that time was what he needed to finally be able to breathe again, to be a person, but <i>this</i> is what he needed to find real peace. </p><p>"I know. It's okay," Xabi says. And he pulls him into his arms, holds him close, one hand cradling his head, the other stroking over his back soothingly.</p><p>"It's the alcohol's fault, I swear. Tolerance has gone to shit in my old age," Stevie says, voice muffled into Xabi's shoulder. </p><p>Xabi just laughs breathlessly against him. "It's okay," he says again against his ear. "It's all good. I get it."</p><p>Afterwards, they curl up together on the bed, not moving, just looking at each other.</p><p>He reaches out and rests his hand on Xabi's cheek, slowly brushes his thumb over his warm skin. "I love you," he tells him softly. </p><p>Xabi just takes his hand in his own, brings it to his mouth, presses a kiss to the delicate space between his thumb and forefinger in response. </p><p>"I'm glad you're here. With me. For this," Stevie tells him.</p><p>"This is the only place I want to be. <i>Always</i>," Xabi promises him, holding his gaze firmly.</p><p>Stevie just smiles at him, gives his hand one last squeeze, before closing his eyes and going to sleep. Maybe years and years ago he wouldn't want this night to end but now he knows that Xabi's going to be right here tomorrow when he wakes up. They have all the time in the world now, as miraculous as that feels. </p><p>He knows that it's still not the ending yet but he thinks if it were, it would be a happy one. </p><p>*</p><p>Xabi sends him pictures of his kids at La Real, texts him videos of them doing stupid things, texts him after matches, wins and losses, like he knows he needs at least that. One lifeline when he feels like everything else is against him.</p><p>Sometimes he calls him in the middle of the night when he's exhausted and feeling so alone and like everything's threatening to collapse around him. </p><p>Xabi just patiently listens to him complain about everything and nothing, interjecting with reassuring words here and there. Stevie just needs to know he's there, that he understands. </p><p>"It's a different kind of pressure, I guess. At least I chose it this time though. But maybe I preferred the other kind. Maybe I'm just a fucking masochist," he says bitterly.</p><p>"It's okay, you know. For it to be simple for once. For it to just be what it is. You don't have to always carry the weight of the world for it to matter. It still means something even if it's not <i>everything</i>."</p><p>"Sometimes I miss it so much, I feel like I'm gonna fucking <i>die</i>," he grits out. "And other times, it's <i>such</i> a relief. And then I just feel guilty about it."</p><p>"I didn't think you'd ever leave for a long time. But you had to. For <i>you</i>. Before it suffocated you," Xabi says gently.</p><p>"Maybe I have to learn all over again. How to be me. Without…without <i>everything</i>." </p><p>"You still have me," Xabi reminds him.</p><p>"Yeah, yeah," he exhales. "That's enough." And he means it with everything he has.</p><p>*</p><p>Stevie comes to visit on a break and Xabi introduces him to his squad and the kids are all starstruck and asking him questions about Istanbul and playing with legends in broken English and it's weird but also really nice. And Xabi just laughs and shakes his head and says, "You know I was with him in Istanbul too, right? But I can relate. Meeting the Liverpool legend himself for the first time. It can be overwhelming." He winks at him and Stevie just rolls his eyes. </p><p>They stand on the sidelines together and watch the team go through their paces. </p><p>"It's so strange," Xabi says after a moment of silence. "They still always seem so young to me. I can’t believe <i>we</i> were ever that young."</p><p>There was a time Stevie never imagined they would ever get <i>old</i>, that they wouldn't stay that way forever. Preserved by a strange alchemy of electric European nights and impossible wins and the songs of the red masses thrumming in your veins. Making you feel truly invincible. </p><p>He never thought that just ten short years later, the noise inside him would go quiet. That his heart would just go empty. He wasn't strong enough anymore. He was tired. One human body isn't enough to contain all the hope and all the pain of entire generations. They'd held him up for years and years but he couldn't hold them up any longer. His foundation was crumbling. It was too much for any one man. He had to disappoint them once, crushing and final, to save himself from a million more disappointments. </p><p>Liverpool can live without Steven Gerrard even if he doesn't know if he can live without them yet. He has to find a way. </p><p>Xabi flicks his gaze across to him now. "You were never really that young though. I remember when I first met you and you weren't even that much older than I was but it felt like you'd seen millenia. Of wars and defeats and suffering and you never stopped fighting. I remember wondering how anyone could have that much faith in something. And I knew then that I'd follow you anywhere. Into any battle. To the ends of the earth."</p><p>"But you didn't," Stevie finishes gravely.</p><p>Xabi lets out a long sigh. "Your kind of love is dangerous, Stevie. It's big and overwhelming and it almost consumed you. I think I knew it would. I wasn't strong enough. Not then. To stay, to watch you crumble underneath it, to try to help you carry that burden."</p><p>"And now?" he asks expectantly.</p><p>"I'm all in. I'd give up my soul if that's what it takes," Xabi says firmly. "Just like you always were ready to do. Maybe it's getting older. Maybe it actually makes you less jaded somehow. You have less to lose. I just have <i>this</i> now. These kids. Liverpool. You. Maybe that makes it easier to believe. Because it's not about <i>me</i> anymore."</p><p>Stevie knows what he means, but he still feels like he's out there with them every single match. It still feels like his to win or lose. He still feels that sense of responsibility. Every season they let it slip away just dredges up all that old disappointment and regret, because he couldn't give them what they needed, he couldn't make them happy. Maybe number six helped with that, to separate it, to absolve himself. Just a little. Maybe it will never completely go away. But maybe he can live with it now. Live with himself.</p><p>"I don't regret any of it, you know. Not really. It may sting sometimes, not ever getting the league and the World Cup and maybe when I'm on my deathbed, I'll still think about that. But I wouldn't change it, the good times, the bad times, none of it. I wouldn't trade it for anything else. It happened how it was supposed to happen. Maybe I wouldn't be able to enjoy it as much if I did. Because there'd always be something else, you know? Another year. Another season. Because you're right. It's not about <i>us</i> anymore. It never really was about us. We were just one short chapter. So now I can just let that weight go. Leave it up to fate."</p><p>"I don’t regret anything either," Xabi says, shaking his head and then looking over at him. "We had our time and it was just as good as everyone remembers. It was better. It was <i>everything</i>."</p><p>Stevie just reaches out and takes his hand and squeezes it for a second before letting it go. </p><p>*</p><p>Mo scores the winner against United in the ninety-third minute and he's just standing there, staring at the TV, feeling like all the air's been sucked out of his lungs. The whole stadium comes unglued and then they start singing. <i>And now you're gonna believe us…</i>, loud and defiant, and it reverberates through his chest and through his bones and his skin's buzzing with a newfound knowledge.</p><p>"<i>Fuck</i>," he says to Xabi on the phone, voice disbelieving. "It's really happening, isn't it?"</p><p>"Yeah," he says back, sounding just as stunned. "I think it might be."</p><p>They're just silent for a moment and then they both just dissolve into soft, incredulous laughter, and it feels like they're kids again, young and giddy and drunk on hope and doing the impossible, and if he ever lost his faith before, if only for a moment, he doesn't remember what that feels like now.</p><p>*</p><p>When the whistle blows at the end of Chelsea vs. City and it's finally official, Xabi just throws his arms around him and they hold on so tightly to each other and they're both laughing and crying and he feels so, so light that he thinks he might just fly away. </p><p>*</p><p>They finally lift the trophy at the end of July and the next morning, Stevie wakes up in a villa in San Sebastián next to Xabi, and he just looks across at him as he smiles at him, slow and warm, his hair haloed by the sun coming through the window behind him.</p><p>After breakfast, Xabi takes his hand and leads him down the shoreline to a small private, sheltered cove.</p><p>They kick a ball around on the sand for a little while before they collapse next to each other onto the ground, looking out at the sea.</p><p>He checks his phone for the first time since last night. There's a reply from Jordan and a video message of Trent and Robbo's drunken antics with the trophy that just makes him smile with fond nostalgia. He sends back quick responses and then he calls Jurgen to congratulate him now that he probably has more time to talk.</p><p>"It's for you. It's yours too," he tells Stevie earnestly. And it's hard not to cry again. </p><p>"You okay?" Xabi asks when he hangs up. </p><p>"Yeah. I just...wish I could've been there," he says wistfully. "But it's also a relief that I don't have to be. They're in safe hands. That's all I wanted."</p><p>Xabi nods at him. "He was the right man to do it. He understands us, you know? He's one of us."</p><p>Stevie just pauses, takes a breath before he says, as casually as possible, "Could be us. One day."</p><p>"Is that what you want?" he asks, like he knows the doubts and fears Stevie's been harbouring. Maybe too much heart gets in the way sometimes. He thinks ever disappointing them again might just be unbearable. Maybe he won't be able to survive it himself. But maybe that's why he <i>has</i> to do it too. Why he had to do all of it. </p><p>"Yeah. It is," Stevie tells him, and it's the first time he's said it out loud to anyone, as a truth, solid and real. "What about you?" </p><p>"You know it is," Xabi affirms. "But I'd gladly give it up for you. Captain's privilege, right?" </p><p>"Maybe we could do it together," he suggests. </p><p>That's why it works now. They have everything they need to win, all the talent and the tactics and the willpower. But they have something more too that gives them the edge, millions of blood red hearts beating in unison, belief, passion, thirty years of it, a hundred years of it, a flame that never goes out even through unspeakable loss and heartbreak, an unstoppable furious love, a sea of red like an advancing army that can conquer the whole world. Maybe his heart gets carried away sometimes but that's why he needs Xabi to balance him out. The head and the heart. Back together. They might just be untouchable. </p><p>Xabi just catches his eye with a hint of a content, knowing smile on his lips. "Maybe," he agrees.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p><i>"It’s only when you play you realise how many people follow the club, how many people you have the ability to make happy that you know you have to win. Nothing else."</i> — Steven Gerrard, 2008</p><p><i>"Stevie is doing a great job at Rangers and Jurgen is doing a great job at Liverpool. But on the day Stevie retired I said one day he would coach Liverpool and I still believe that. It has been incredible what Jurgen has been doing at Liverpool. I managed to win the Champions League with the club and it was another special Champions League victory for them last season. But I know how much those fans want the Premier League title. It has been so long and even though it is still early in the season there is real belief the wait is almost over."</i> — Xabi Alonso, 2019</p><p><i>"When Liverpool won the Champions League, I was looking around the fans thinking: ‘They’re all happy again’, it made me feel better again. After Madrid, looking around they were all sad again, but the Champions League last year was a healing moment for me. I think winning the league would definitely play a part."</i> — Steven Gerrard, 2020</p><p><i>"Steven Gerrard – this club is built on, in the last 20 years, on Stevie’s legs. He had to carry all of the pressure on his shoulders and he did that exceptionally. I am really happy that we can deliver this title to him as well."</i> — Jurgen Klopp, 2020</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>